Building, Building, Building!
/We've crossed a couple BIG projects off the list these past couple of weeks: Last Frontier Mushing Co-op Storefront Yurt and moving our old handler cabin.
1- Last Frontier Mushing Co-op Storefront
Last season, Matt and Amanda of Smokin' Ace Kennels were kind enough to allow us to run tours out of their yurt, but this year, we're expanding. Over the summer, we've prepped a new storefront location directly between our two kennels. With the help of a few friends, we erected our Mongolian Yurt in just a few days! The video below provides a visual of a few of the steps. In the video you'll see Matt, Amanda, Kelsey, Tyler, and myself running around. As they say- it takes a village! Basic steps for the yurt assembly are:
1- Build the deck (thanks Matt and Tom!)
2- Set up the door and arrange the lattice around the door.
3- Put the center ring on pillars and place it in the center of the deck.
4- Place one spoke per "x" in the lattice and secure it to the center ring.
5- Pull a white sheet around the frame.
6- Place felt insulation around the yurt. We used two layers given our cold winters.
7- Wrap the house in the waterproof outer layer and tie everything up with the three long ropes made of horse hair.
8- Wrap the house in the blue "skirt" and give everyone high fives!
Our other big project (or I should say, one of the other big projects) was moving the handler cabin. A few years ago, we built a small 12x14 cabin. This was the first cabin I helped build, so I'm rather attached to it. We considered leaving it at our old house, but we decided- when there's a will, there's a way- let's bring it with us!
The cabin itself is about 12x14, but when you add in the roof overhang, it's a hefty load. We rented a double axle trailer from a place in town and went to work with bottle jacks to hoist it up and on the trailer.
Once on the trailer, we drove the cabin to our new kennel and positioned it back in the woods. A big thank you to Tyler and Tom for all your hard work! We weren't sure it was going to be possible, but I'm so thrilled it all worked out.
The video below is of building the cabin from a few years ago. It describes how we harvested the logs, peeled the logs, stacked the logs, and scribed between them to make the cabin.
So what's next on the construction list? Sanding the inside walls of our new home, wiring the upstairs, and insulating and sheet rock of the upstairs. And of course RUNNING DOGS!!!! We'll officially start Fall Training on September first. We've run the dogs occasionally the past week just to stretch out and keep them happy, but our real season will start in about one week. This upcoming Saturday, Scott Chesney will be taking class portraits, so keep an eye out. It's about time for MUSHING SEASON!!!!
